The motherhood choice

I just love reading articles about the choice whether or not to become a mother.

This is because I'm a 42-year-old childless woman, so it's no longer really my problem; it's much as if I were a crusty old doctor kicking back with a piece about hospital interns working 24 hours a day. Therefore, I was thrilled when, recently in the Fairfax press, Clem Bastow wrote about being in her late 20s and defiantly childless, and Emma McDonald issued a warning in response that it's all very well to be in your 20s and cavalier about not having children but that you may then reach your late 30s, start desperately to want a baby, discover that you can't and then, presumably, go out of your mind with grief.

Personally, as I've aged I've been astonished to discover that my feelings about having children have run precisely counter to the direction that such works as the Scott Baio telemovie Mixed Blessings had led me to believe they would. That is, when I was in my 20s I was sure I wanted to have children, and it was certainly not the case that I was having too much fun even to think about it, given that I was, like many people in their 20s, having almost no fun at all. Too, my desire to become a mother was helped no end by the fact that I didn't actually know any children personally. When, however, I was Clem Bastow's age, I was employed by a woman who brought her baby to the office every day, and the way in which his presence led to damp morsels of food lying around really began to put me off the idea. Then, as my 30s continued, I found that I, quite simply, liked my life as it was - yes, I was dying to go on maternity leave, but only if I could do it sans baby. If I had had a boyfriend who was keen to have children, I might, I admit, have been talked into it but the man in question was possibly even less keen on the idea that I was. Now that I'm in my 40s, my biggest source of unease is that when I'm finally menopausal I'm going to be pining for the time when I used to be able to spend a couple of days a month doped up on codeine.

While I feel a certain amount of sympathy for women who want to have children and can't, this is only because I appreciate that badly wanting something you can't have is one of the most effective ways to ensure deep unhappiness on a daily basis. However, what I can't grasp is why someone who wants to and can't have children feels that this state of affairs ranks as a tragedy that must be fixed at all costs. The way I look at whether it's important that I get pregnant is that, first, I'm not trying to keep a grip on, say, the principality of Monaco; and, second, I cannot believe that my genes are so spectacular they must be carried on for the sake of all humanity. I suppose that through bearing children I would achieve a kind of immortality but it's my understanding that my children would die too eventually, as would their children, should my children, in turn, even choose to be parents. I realise that many women genuinely do have a thing for babies but, geez, babyhood lasts only a tiny amount of time - to put it baldly, if you're so keen on babies, you would be better off getting a job in an infants modelling agency. Most bizarrely of all, I recall one account of involuntary childlessness that singled out the prospect of Christmas Day with no children around as a major reason why not becoming a parent would be devastating for the woman in question. Even assuming that a Christmas Day without children doesn't sound more appealing than otherwise, it is, to my knowledge, merely one day of the year.

Now, none of the above is intended as an argument against embarking on parenthood. Furthermore, it would be my wish that anyone who really wants to have children, and isn't a psychopath, should be able to do so without any trouble. However, I also feel that anyone who spends thousands of dollars on in-vitro fertilisation is out of her mind, because I just can't see that it matters whether any particular individual has children or not. It seems to me that this mania for becoming a parent exists at least partly because, in these, relatively, godless times, doing so has replaced organised religion as a reliable means of feeling that one's existence has some kind of deep purpose.

As it happens, I am very grateful that I ended up not having children, because there are only about four things I actually enjoy doing, and parenting isn't conducive to any of them. However, I will cheerfully concede that if I had had children, they may well have been the best thing that ever happened to me. On the other hand, it is equally likely that I would have loathed them and they me. The point is, though, that it is entirely possible to leave it too late to have a child and have no regrets, beyond the fact, in my case, that I will never have a famous and wealthy son or daughter who will buy me real estate. Actually, contrary to the conventional wisdom, I believe that women are luckier than men when it comes to reproductive capability, as we are relieved so much earlier than they are of the burden of choice.

No-one will ever convince me that either having children or not having children is the right decision per se, as it can only ever be the right decision for oneself. Having said that, though, my advice would be that when it comes to becoming a parent, as with becoming an actor, unless you have an instinctive, unexplainable urge to take on the stresses and strains involved, leave it alone. And if you do have this urge to have children but are not able to fulfil it, find something else to do and move on. Life's too short to spend it agonising over not having given it to someone else.

Sarina Rowell freelances as a writer, and as a book editor and a script editor.